The statements in this section merely provide background information related to the present disclosure and may not constitute prior art.
Plastic jewelry charms are typically constructed from large sheets of molded plastic which are cut into a desired shape and have a unitary construction. The charms are then typically covered with an adhesive-backed sheet of material containing some type of decorative element such as various colors, shapes or images, for example. Owing to the high cost of the machinery involved in producing such items, it is not cost effective to produce smaller batches of charms having different and/or user-specified decorative elements displayed thereon.
Owing to recent advancements in ink and printing technology, the inventor has discovered various methods of printing decorative elements directly onto plastic charms of various shapes and sizes utilizing commercially available ink jet printers. To this end, as such printers are only capable of printing along a single plane, it is necessary for the printer to be able to access the front and back sides of a charm simultaneously, in order to impart a custom and/or user-provided decorative element onto the charm.
The present invention, for a direct printed jewelry charm and method of making, differs from the conventional art in a number of aspects. The manner by which will become more apparent in the description which follows, particularly when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.